Ethel Ohlin Bradford

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Home Is Where The Heart Is

Everyone wants to go home. The infant, far too young to know anything about home, is still aware that in a certain room and in a certain crib . . . he relaxes and sleeps better. The school boy, visibly glad to be home, tosses his books aside, reaches for the milk and cookies and tells his mother of his day.

Or the sick . . . weary in body and soul . . . who resolutely maintain that “I am sick, and I may even die, but if such must be, please let it happen in my own home and bed”.

And each of us knew exactly what Jacqueline Kennedy meant, when knowing her days were numbered, asked to be taken home, and John, her young son, did so and, only days later, she died in her own room, surrounded by her books, music, pictures and people she knew and loved. Ah yes, and it’s a sorrow that her son, John couldn’t have had the same for himself, rather than a plane crash in the cold Atlantic.

Every bride and groom rightfully glory in their own home, but, (remember?) it’s a long time before there’s no mix-up when one of them says, “Let’s go home for Sunday dinner.” Whose home? Her childhood home? His parent’s home? Their home?

In fact it’s not until children come along that the difference is clear, and even then, it’s a compromise, for then is when their old childhood homes become known, not as theirs, but as Grandparent’s homes. Yeah, you’ve seen these changes in your life, too.

And a definite feeling of ownership remains long after we’ve moved. We wouldn’t ever want to live there again, but we see where others have cut down a tree we planted, have done some repainting, or even some remodeling, and, as we pass by, can’t help but stare, and become, for the moment, the ‘one’ who once called that place home. And we wonder, that if the new owners change the outside, just what have they done to . . . oh, the kitchen, living room, or if that favorite spot by the fireplace is still there.. Yeah, we chose to no longer live there, but, ln a certain part of our heart, that place will remain forever, ‘home’.

And though it’s been decades since I lived, as a member of the Ohlin family, at the NW corner of 7th East and 4500 South, in the Salt Lake valley and no matter how high the apartment buildings now rise there, to me, as I pass, I see old irrigation ditches, barns, Dad’s cornfields, and the sheds for coal, animals, and even Grandma’s small home. Yeah, it was and remains. Ethel’s basic Human Life home.

We look forward to vacations, but when the trip is over, and our eyes turn homeward, some bit of tension deep within us (tension we weren’t even aware of) relaxes and the closer we get to home, the more at ease we become. And, if driving, once we start on our way, the milestones come thick and fast. First we see the mountains rising out of the flatlands of the Midwest, then we reach the State Line, and before we know it, there’s the county line, the skyline of the city we know so well. Then every bit of the scenery is known and then . . . then home. Yeah, and no matter how we joyously planned the vacation, we inwardly rejoice, for finally we want to be home again. Home, home, home at last.

And if you’re like me, for some reason I must then check each room to convince myself that I’m really home and everything is still all in the right places, too.

Yes, ah yes, there’s something within the heart of each of us that craves the security of home. And though at times, each of us wishes for the money and time to travel whenever and wherever we please . . . we know that those who do nothing but skim the world, and have no place they have as a base, are the ones to be pitied, not envied.

The ailing want to go home and it’s a proven fact that we do recuperate faster at ‘home’. And when death comes it comes with greater peace and dignity when met in the person’s own home, surrounded by his own possessions, in rooms he has lived, worked, and loved in.

Yes, we go home for holidays. Home to see Mom and Dad. Home to visit friends and home to have the new babies blessed in the old family church, with familiar people in charge.

And I wouldn’t be surprised if our deep yearning for home will only be satisfied when the trials and joys of life are over and Our Father calls us to our Real Home.

Only there, me thinks, will that ever-constant yearning for ‘home’ be satisfied for only when we become One with the Source of All, will we find peace and contentment. Home, our Real Home. Our Final Home, God’s Home.

2 thoughts on “Home Is Where The Heart Is”

There is much of the heart in this blog. The memories, the feelings, the ‘result’, the idea of love and belonging. I suspect that as our memories fill up the bucket and heart our longing for the home becomes attractive and addictive.

Try this one: He Never Knows
He who stays at home
Thru rain and sunny weather,
Never knows the distant road,
Bordered by heather.

Never knows the ocean’s roar,
Nor the foam curved sand,
Never hears the whistling train,
Sees the lifted hand;

Yet, the wanderer who goes
From sea to alien loam,
Never knows the quiet peace,
The wonder that is home.
–Anon

My childhood visions of Grandpa’s house and Grandma’s home are all before adulthood and glued in place by mortality. But, I loved the garden, the hiding places in the corn and the nibble of currents.

Oh James, I take it that you are t he ohe I have always known as Jim. How good your words are. You think in the same lane of th ought that a i think and I thank God it is so.
My memories, too go back to childhood there at the old home and even before our Baby Sis of Bernice was born. Long, long a go, long long ago. “Sing me the ta les that were to me were so dear . . . . long, long ago. Long ago.” yES, AND DEARER BECAUSE OF THEM BEING SO OLD AND CHERISHED. Your mother was my placlosest playmant. I love your w ords. Keep them up. ME.